Monthly Archives: Dec 2017

 

deaf Māori

Reading in the newspaper last night and it was a pleasant surprise to hear from an interpreter who works with Māori deaf people.
Well, I might say that I will have to type this blog out of my laptop until something will be found to replace my iMac desktop. It is not easy for me while I am having nerve pain due to nerve root damage in the cervical spine.

Stephanie, Patrick and I go way back to late 1970’s in Hamilton. Patrick and I went to the same schools – Melville Intermediate and High School in Hamilton. I was at Melville High for two years, and I moved to Hillcrest High School until I got the first job as a BNZ Bank Officer in 1981.
I recalled with Patrick who has had no connection with his whakapapa and Māori culture during our school times. Of course, we did not learn any te reo Māori at school except my mother who studied te reo Māori through the University of Waikato. I recalled my mother travelled with a group of students to East Coast and around Bay of Plenty and she learnt to understand the culture and te reo Māori for her papers. I often wonder and why Patrick did not learn to do te reo Māori or know where he came from through his family. I met Stephanie when she became an interpreter along with Sam Manuatu – an interpreter from Auckland in 1982. Of course, there was another interpreter I remember Scott Williams, and he travelled down from Auckland via Te Kauwhata.
Yes, Stephanie encourages Patrick to relearn his culture and whakapapa from time to time.
Patrick and I drifted away, and we went separate paths of our life such as I travelled around the world and I took up my BA degree at the University of Waikato, he moved to Auckland and started doing te reo Māori and established the first Māori deaf hui and group.

Patrick learnt that I took up paper in linguistic along with History and Anthropology. He contacted me several times, but we did not entirely keep in touch because of his committed to working with Māori deaf people. Stephanie came to interpreting for me at the University of Waikato, and we often talked about Patrick and his works. Patrick’s life was taken away suddenly due to cancer in 2014. It made the impact on many Māori deaf people, the community, schools for the Deaf, friends and family, especially many interpreters to lose Patrick BUT they never forget him and his work.
Kua hinga te totara i te wao nui a Tane

As a linguist – yes it is essential for all Māori deaf people to learn about their whakapapa and te reo Māori today and the urgent needs of more interpreters to sign te reo Māori in the marae, tangi, hui, even in the Government where the speakers/MPs speaks Māori and many other places.
Ko taku reo taku ohooho, ko taku reo taku mapihi mauria

Note – There was no Deaf Aotearoa (Deaf Association of New Zealand) in Hamilton around early 1980s – I recalled it was around in 1982 or 1983. The first office of Deaf Aotearoa (formally Deaf Association of New Zealand) was in 1980 which officially opened in Auckland. The Deaf people established to run the service in 1977 in Auckland.

 

 

 

 

We bought our property as first joint account holders over three years ago. I was familiar with the mortgage for a long time, and I used to have two leases before I met my partner. Now we don’t have a huge mortgage to pay off… The last two mortgages, under my name, wrote off since I sold my second home.

We were lucky to have an extra old house which was not fit to live in and a large old farm barn here. I began to do some research on the property we bought. I am not writing about Deaf people due to hold off on further notice. I remember my childhood in the old days, and I visited several cousins and great grand uncles and aunties in the farms around Waikato, Ohakune and Bay of Plenty. Two of my great grand uncles told me heaps, of stories about farming life, butchery and labourers even gardening too. Great uncle Tom as we called him, came from our Mama’s side family of the Watkinson and the Yates. Great uncle Tom passed away several months ago and his wife Claire passed away last month. They were never separate when they were travelling or meeting families. The second great grand uncle was Fred, and his wife was Joy. Uncle Tom was a Hinton family while Uncle Fred was a Yates family. Fred’s wife Joy was a cousin to Uncle Tom.

Why am I typing this blog?

The old house, the current home we are living and the old farm barn is a site on the Hinton Road. I looked at the old house, and it built pre the 1930s at the time we were looking for a property to buy. It makes me wonder, and I felt something draw me to purchase our property.

We decided to pull down the old house because it was not fit to live in and no power even there was meter boxes there. Every time we were stripping back to skeleton frames of the structure house. We saw much fantastic work of skills by the farm guys, for example, they installed hay with cow manure for insulation around the interior walls, rimu woods, black wattle woods, Mahanoy woods. The house was two bedrooms, a kitchen, a separate bathroom and a toilet room, a dining room and finally a small porch. The ceiling structure was terrific, and the ceilings were high raised like a chapel shape roof. But it was two layers due to strength the roof and some additional structure heights for tall farm hand men. We looked at the way of men putting structures up into walls and floors and frame the beams up in the ceilings.

This house was used for a young couple – one of my cousins through Uncle Tom’s uncle, Arthur Guy or Ross. Then a son of either Arthur or Ross, built a second home after 1945, where we are, living now. It is a three bedrooms cottage and a large sunroom and a double carport.

This old home was no longer for a young couple, and it was for young farm hand men while the couple moved into a new house which was on the same site where we are living now. This old home was no longer for a young couple, and it was for young farm hand men while the couple moved into a new house which was on the same site where we are living now.

The large farm barn gave us delighted and joy what the previous owners left for us. We told about the pieces of stuff they were no longer to take with them to Hamilton. I found more good woods to make items of furniture such as the table, chopping boards, shelves or wooden box. There were many old parts such as washing taps, hose for laying down in the ground, water tube for gardening, tools, gutters, roof sheets, ladders and many more. We were lucky to have our skills from our ancestors that taught us to use the skills for our needs.

We stripped the old woods from the old house and stored in the barn for fire woods over winter sessions. We have not brought any firewoods from any suppliers because a trailer of gum woods cost around $350.00 to $500.00. Another year will come, and we will start planning where to find more firewoods around 2019 or 2020. On the section, I saw black wattle trees which are suitable for kindlings, but I will have to be careful because they proliferate into large trees.

Inside the barn, the structures were an excellent condition to built longer except the walls showed sign of rusts due to facing north. There was no floor, just dirt and on one corner there is another power connection as well. The barn was enormous and well airing when the large door opened. The barn built around the 1950s according to Tom, and he asked me what I am going to do with the barn and the old house for the last three years. My reply was the old house coming down and make way for greenhouse or a small native garden. The barn will stay and to restore into something else like two separate rooms – one is a large workshop for my partner to do carpentry while I will have a studio.

Tom said there was a fire around Eureka in January 1935. Fire in Eureka

Fred and Joy, I called them Uncle Fred and aunty Joy for many years when my late grandma – Biddy (Mama) took me around to visit them during the school holidays. We visited Flossie Yates who she was a deaf lady, and she related to Fred. Another story about Flossie – she went down to Van Asch School, Christchurch, from the 1920s. Flossie do not sign because she lip read well.
Joy always talked about her Hinton family and the past where she grew up in Ngaruawahia and visited cousins in Eureka.

The men and farm hand workers built the houses, barns, stations, stud homes and they grew blueberries orchards, even become butchers, farmers, labourers and Horse show riders.

Surely I settled down where our place is called home at last, and it is away from the city of Hamilton.

 

Note: I was working from my laptop, not the iMac desktop due to cooling fan failed.